Plato's Dialogues One by One

952 Pages·1999·2.37 MB·English

by  Victorino Tejera

Plato's Dialogues One By One : A
title:
Dialogical Interpretation
author: Tejera, V.
publisher: University Press of America
isbn10 | asin: 0761809937
print isbn13: 9780761809937
ebook isbn13: 9780585162324
language: English
subject Plato.--Dialogues.
publication date: 1999
lcc: B395.T36 1999eb
ddc: 184
subject: Plato.--Dialogues.
Page i
Plato's Dialogues One By One
A Dialogical Interpretation
Victorino Tejera
University Press of America,® Inc.
Lanham · New York · Oxford
Page ii
Copyright © 1999 by
University Press of America,® Inc.
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All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
British Library Cataloging in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tejera, V. (Victorino)
Plato's dialogues one by one / Victorino Tejera.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
Contents: v. l. A Dialogical interpretation. 1. Plato, Dialogues. I.
Title.
B395T36 1997 184dc21 97-4571932256 CIP
ISBN 0-7618-0993-7 (cloth: alk. ppr.)
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum
requirements of American National Standard for Information
SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI
Z39.481984
Page iii
Contents
Foreword: On Reading Plato's Dialogues Dialogically vii
1 The Apology and the Phaedo: Plato's Tragic Humor 1
Why the Apology is not a Judicial Defense 1
Sokrates' No-Lose Alternative and the Anytus Episode 7
in the Meno
Sokrates' Conversational Style, His Dominance, and His 10
Wit
A Myth and Sokrates' "Idea" of the Earth 19
Plato's Socratism 21
2. Plato's Parmenides: On the Structurarion of Its Ironies 27
Getting into the Dialogism and Architectonics of the 27
Parmenides
How Are We to Take Parmenides' Rehearsal of the 31
Difficulties in the Theory of Ideas?
Discussion of the Best Training Method for the Pursuit 33
of Knowledge
The Pedagogical Demonstration as also a Satire on 34
Sophistic Deductivism
Page iv
3. Irony and Allegory in the Phaedrus: Aristotle's Note on 41
Irony in the Phaedrus
The Initial Interaction 41
Normal Madness and Formless Essence 43
Sokrates' Critique of Speaking and Writing 46
Dialectic and Rhetoric, Philosophy and Writing 50
4. History and Rhetoric in the Meno: On the Difficulties of 57
Communicating Human Excellence
The Situational Irony 58
Interrogation and Hypothesis, Narrative and 63
Recollection in Meno
Knowledge is Sacred, but So Is Right Opinion When, 71
Like Inspiration, It Produces Goodness
5. The Gorgias: On the Use of Rhetoric and the Good of 77
Politics
Speechmaking and Dialectic 77
Refutations and Reversals 78
Getting Sophistic Rhetoric into Proportion 80
Wrongdoing and Rhetoric 82
Kallicles, Rhetoric, and the Desire for More 84
Sarcasm and Sophistry, Argument and Allegory 85
6. Irony, Dialogue, and Dialectic: An Interdialogical 93
Interlude
On the Use of the Term "Irony" in the Dialogues 93
Dialogue and Dialectic, Analytical and Logical 100
Eleatic Method 101
The Protagoras as a Dissòs Lógos, or Protagoras 102
Protagorized
Is Plato's Parmenides an Eleaticized Protagoras or 103
Parmenides Zenonized?
The Underlying Design of the Dialogues 106
Aristotle Again 108
7. The Protagoras: A Dialogical Reading of the 109
Personified Antilogy
Architectonics and Dynamics of the Dialogue-Form 110
The Personified Antilogy 111
Relevance of the Prelude and the Satirico-Dramatic By- 112
Play
Page v
Sokrates Questions the Unity Attributed to the 115
Excellences by Protagoras
Sokrates' Amusing Anti-Lecture on Simonides' Poem 118
The Eristics about Aretê 119
What is the Point of the Last Debate about Pleasure and 121
Pain, Good and Evil?
8. The Charmides: Self-Knowledge and the Knowledge of125
Knowledge
To Have an Excellence and to Define It 125
Wherein a Snob and a Sophist Is Satirized 130
The Debate about Knowledge of Knowledge and 132
Knowledge of Oneself
9. The Theaetetus and the Birth of Epistemology 143
Maieutic Art and Hypothetical Method 143
"Antilogies" about "Knowledge Itself" 155
"Antilogies" about Wrong Judgment 170
A Dream Account of Logical Accounts, and the 173
Acceptance of the False Pregnancy
10. Plato's Eleatic Sophist: Looking at a Sophist from Elea181
"A Really Philosophical Person" 181
What a Clever Dog Does When He Has a Bad Name 185
The Sophistical "Refutation" of Parmenides 191
The Views and Performance of the Elean Sophist 196
The Relation of the 'Sophist' to the Impending Trial 205
11. The Politics of a Sophistic Rhetorician: A Sophistic De209
Monarchia
Plato's Dialogism and the Subject-Matter of the 209
'Politicus'
The Political Art as a Pythagorist 'Science' 213
Isolating and 'Purifying' the Kingship 216
Constitutional Government versus Sophistic 'Science' 220
The Sophist's Kingly Craft as 'Methoria' 224
Pythagorism and the Idea of Monarchy in the Fourth 226
Century B.C.
Page vi
12. Plato's Counter-Utopia: The Republic 233
Section I: A Remedial Constitution 233
A Monumental Dramatic Sketch 233
The Point of View and the Dramatic Date 234
The Human Setting and the Political Context 237
The Intellectual Background of the Transmission of 241
the Dialogues
Section II: A Structural Critique 249
Why People Think Socrates Is Plato's Spokesman 249
Architectonic Irony of the Republic 252
Tone and Texture of Socrates' Narrative Construction259
The Problem of Implementation and the Role of the 264
'Philosopher' in the State
The Machinery of the Divided Line, and the 268
Conception of Justice
Section III: The Mathematical Humor in Books VIII 275
and IX
Structural and Allusional Ironies of the 'Nuptial 275
Number'
Some Textural Ironies 278
Modelling for Fun, and the Feasibility of the 280
Discursive Polity
"It's Easier to Model in Words than in Wax" 283
Appendix 286
13. Excursus: The Question of Form and the Problem of 291
the Laws
The External Evidence from the Aristotelian Politics 291
What Constitutes Internal Evidence? 292
External Evidence from D. Laertius and Aulus Gellius 295
Mimetic Structure and Socio-Intellectual Allusiveness 297
of the Dialogues
Plato's Philosophic Awareness and Formal Mastery 299
Can a Designer Forget How to Design? 301
Oral-Aural Community of the Polis, Visual-Graphic 304
Anomie of Conquered Easternized Greece
14. A Garland of "Yesterdays" 309
A Narrative Wreath to Celebrate the Festival of an 309
Unnamed Goddess
What Kind of Tale Is the Atlantic-Story? 315